The end of the megachurch?

To be honest, I think that as long as Americans love bigness, there will be megachurches. A pastor I met on a flight last week noted that many pastors love megachurches because it gets them a big name for a big salary and big book deals, while many church attenders love megachurches because it prevents them from being truly served by the pastor.

I sure hope that small, intimate churches will be the wave of the future, but to get there, I think there will need to be a LOT of repentance on the part of pastors–not all of them serving at megachurches–to remember that their job isn’t just to get rears in pews and hands writing tithe checks, but rather to truly serve the spiritual needs of their congregations.

Hoping and praying……

I think the mega church is kind of like the shopping mall. It may be the result of the mobile society. The new family in town can easily jump right into the megachurch. The “rules” are explicit. They are immediately included etc. The church is filled with other mobile folks from other places who want to connect to new people and make new friends. In small churches where everyone already has friends, they don’t need new friends to socialize with. So, the new family may be the only new family and will be able to attend service and Sunday school and regularly scheduled events, but won’t be able to make as many friends. The mega church is like kindergarten. The smaller church is like high school. In kindergarten everyone is looking for friends. In high school everyone already has their friends. Every kid is the new kid in kindergarten. In high school the new kid has no connections to the people but he can still participate in the official school activities.

I guess we need to define “megachurch,” because to me I would say that Bill Hybels has a stereotypical megachurch, whereas John MacArthur does not.

Yet, @#3, if a megachurch is defined by a personality other than Jesus, as both of those are, I think that may bespeak a problem.

A megachurch is just defined as a church that has 2,000 or more attendees during its Sunday services. So, within that definition, you have your good and your bad, those run well and those that stand to serve pastoral personalities. Frankly, defining it by numbers alone provides us with hundreds and hundreds of such churches around the country, and it makes stereotyping about them difficult and dangerous.

And from what I recall, the Crystal Cathedral had more than just financial troubles. Wasn’t there a rather significant rift within the Schuller family (perhaps healed, perhaps not)? That alone–something found in churches of all shapes and sizes–could certainly cause plenty of other problems.

People will always be drawn to dynamic leaders. In a church, a dynamic leader who is also a great preacher will always draw people in. This is not inherently bad! If that leader is a Godly man who preachers the Truth and draws many people to Jesus (not just to himself), then he will likely lead what we call a “mega” church. How well that church organizes to effectively pastor individual people is the bigger ecclesiastical issue. Mega churches must strive to do ministry on a small scale (small groups, Bible studies, children’s ministries, youth ministry, etc.) in order to actually pastor the church.

There are some big advantages that come with being a mega church, but there are also big disadvantages. But the same could be said for small churches and medium size churches as well! It is not the size of the church that matters. It is the confession and practice of the church that counts. If your confession is True and your practice is a response and reflection of that Truth, then the size of your church is irrelevant.

There is no perfect church model. No perfect size, no perfect format, no perfect number of pastors, no perfect people. Just a perfect Savior and the hope of His coming perfect kingdom.

Well said. (all of the above)

I would LOVE to see a good centerist, Christ centered and grounded Lutheran mega-church. But the little ones will do nicely, as well.

I agree that the metric isn’t the most helpful here. Sheer size says very little about a church or its viability. However, of more interest to me is the reason behind the continuation or abandonment of mega-churches. To the traditional/community church model, there is something like a spiritual reason for smaller churches. For Schuller and others, I suspect it will only be socioeconomic pressure that demands resizing. If so, then I fully expect to see an economic boom be accompanied by mega-church growth.

“lots of megachurches still exist. But do you think their time has passed?”

Megachurches get a large percentage of their sheep from other smaller churches. When that supply dries up, it will be harder for megachurches to grow.

At least some of the congregants (audience members?) in a megachurch are there to avoid accountability. Gather enough of these characters in one place, and they will hinder growth.

Many megachurches do not offer the Lord’s Supper. If and when congregants (audience members?) realize that they are missing a true “mark of the church,” the megachurch will lose growth.

There. That’s my snotty answer. Catch me in a better mood and I will give some advantages of a megachurch. 🙂

Dr. Veith, your post really misrepresents what is happening here. It makes it sound as if the Crystal Cathedral is closing its doors, and apartments will fill the now-vacant site. That is not the case.

The actual proposed deal, as I understand it, is that the property on which the cathedral itself, and many other church and commercial structures (the office building which houses the church administration, the Hour of Power building, other buildings that are commercially leased presently), sit would be sold to a developer for $46 million. The C.C. would get a 15 year leaseback provision, leasing the church portions of the property for a negotiated rate so that the church would continue to be on-site for at least the next 15 years. They would also receive a four year exclusive option to re-purchase the church portions of the property for $30 million. For every apartment the developer is able to build on the commercial portions of the property, the buy-back price would be reduced by $20,000. As you can see, that is a very different situation than you represented.

As for megachurches, the C.C. is hardly representative of all megachurches. Those which are similarly weak theologically, and which have similarly egotistical pastors, and parasitic pastoral families may well suffer a similar fate. Others which are more doctrinally sound and less personality-driven will not.

Bubba wrote (@1), “I think that as long as Americans love bigness, there will be megachurches.” Which really only begs the question: will Americans always love bigness?

The most obvious comparison to me is the mall, which also was very popular in its heyday … a few decades ago. Sure, there are still malls around today, but they don’t appear as popular as they once were. In fact, I find many of them sad, shells of their former selves (in some cases literally). If megachurches were now to begin a decline, perhaps that would only be one more sign that American Christianity tends to lag the surrounding culture by a decade or more.

I think there will always be some megachurches around, because that will always appeal to at least some people. But it does seem that “big, corporate, and entertaining” is kind of on the outs these days, compared to “small, engaging, and authentic”. Not that small necessarily means authentic, and not that “authentic” can’t be faked for the purpose of drawing people in (coughEmergentscough).

I wonder if we can predict the future of American (consumer) Christianity by looking at trends in shopping. In the past decade or so, the trend I’ve noticed is towards “lifestyle centers” — collections of shops that are in many ways identical to malls, but instead of being gathered under one roof, they are arranged in a fake village style with architecture harkening to some other time and place (in the Portland area, think Bridgeport Village). As such, they tend to have better restaurants than the usual mall food court, since it feels more like you’re eating at some Italian bistro in a (fake) quaint villa, after a day of shopping at Crate & Barrel and Anthropologie. So it really is just a mall, but it’s not a mall. It doesn’t feel as monolithic. The environment isn’t entirely controlled. It feels like the sort of place you might go on vacation. And it remains every bit as shallow and corporate as a mall.

So … how would you rework the megachurch concept along those lines?

I wonder if the megachurches thrive best in denominations like DonS’s, which reject the sacraments. How can 2,000 people come forward for the Lord’s Supper, without dozens of pastors to distribute it? How can 2,000 people confortably participate in the liturgy? How can a church of 2.000 accommodate auricular confession? I’m not saying that megachurches and the sacraments are not compatible; I’m saying that megachurches thrive in the nonsacramental atmosphere of pastors wearing head mikes and rock bands on stage.

Jon, I’m not sure why you felt the need to call me out @ 12, other than to be provocative for some reason I guess only you know. However, I don’t really see why a sacramental church cannot be large, or what the arbitrary cut-off would be. Is there a theological problem with having a plurality of pastors administer the sacraments during the service?

It sounds as if we are somehow attaching a theological value with a numerical one. Large churches can work out the logistics of distribution of the Lord’s Supper without compromising their theology! It is easy to pick out the theological shortcomings of specific examples of mega churches. But is there virtue in smallness? Are Lutherans proud of their small churches? Do we want them to stay small? I hope not! Any pastor or church leader who sees growth as a problem to avoid does not know the Jesus I know. Growth may create problems that we need to address, but it is not a problem in and by itself.

Does the absence of growth reveal a lack of health and vitality? The presence of growth does not by itself prove health, but the absence of growth in our own churches should cause us to take a closer look at ourselves and drive us to prayer and repentance before it drives us throw rocks at other churches.

Jon (@12), I’m not aware of any WELS megachurches, though there appear to at least be a handful of LCMS ones, which presumably remain sacramental.

Still, that same list makes it quite clear that megachurches are far more common among Baptists and “non-denominational” types. From that list above, here are the top megachurch denominations:

Independent, Nondenominational = 375
Southern Baptist Convention = 227
Baptist (unspecified) = 125
Assemblies of God = 89
United Methodist Church = 69
Calvary Churches = 57
Independent Christian Churches or unspecified = 57
Four Square = 23

Not exactly popular with the sacramental types, as best I can tell.

Jon, churches which accept the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper simply have their deacon or elder boards distribute the elements. It’s also worth noting that in their heyday, the gigantic cathedrals and churches of Europe were in fact sacramentalist churches which served the Lord’s Supper to thousands. For example, the Evangelische church in Worms just across the street from the cathedral where Luther was excommunicated would easily hold a thousand worshippers, I believe.

tODD; living an hour from the Mall of America, suffice it to say that my impression is that plenty of Americans are still plenty impressed by bigness. Agreed 100% that it’s nice when we get away from it, though. :^)

Bert, when the typical US megachurch begins to resemble the “gigantic cathedrals” or “sacramentalist churches which served the Lord’s Supper to thousands,” let me know. In those days, you simply didn’t have the 25,000 competitive denominations to chose from that you have today; people gathered in big churches to worship as a community.

But I see your larger point – nothing prevents the sacraments from being celebrated in a very large church. I certainly agree. When I hear “megachurch” I think of the baptistics like Chuck Smith, John MacArthur, Robt Schuller, etc., not the parish priest.

Bubba (@16), without wanting to get too derailed by a discussion of malls themselves, sure, superlative malls remain popular — or, as you said, “impressive”. They’re pure spectacle. I’m sure the largest malls, as well as the largest (mega)churches, will always be a draw for people.
Heck, I’ve been tempted, when back in Houston, to visit the Joel Osteen basketball and hockey arena (in case you don’t catch the reference, the building Mr. Osteen’s shiny visage is beamed from used to house several professional sports teams, back when I was in Houston). Just to see the spectacle. Of course, having seen a few of Mr. Osteen’s “sermons” on TV, I know I would only enjoy the spectacle and nothing more, if I did go.

But looking at the extremes is likely not the best way to assess where the culture is going, as a whole. What about the normal malls, still rather large when compared to your average collection of shops? Are they still as popular as they were in the 80s? Has mall shopping declined? Likewise, what about the “average” megachurch, not the one that’s nationally known? I don’t see them taking a hit in attendance in the immediate future, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they soon began a decline from their height of popularity.

tODD; Wal-Mart, Target…..sorry, hope it’s different for you out in Oregon, but getting things at anything but a big box store/megastore or mall is getting pretty difficult these days. And, for that matter, in many places, it’s getting fairly hard to find churches that aren’t doing a bit of the megachurch thing. A little Catholic church near where I used to live built a big old barn behind their gorgeous small building and started advertising the Alpha course–you’d think they’d gone evangelical.

Good for reaching people with the Scriptures, now for actual discipleship along the lines of what Christ practiced….mebbe not so hot.

Jon; Schuller is Reformed, about as Baptistic as you are.

Bert, “baptistic”in the sense of denying the Real Presence.

The passage below represented a great number of men who listened to Peter and believed the Gospel, 5,00o men. That was a mega-church. Because some large churches have turned from the Gospel doesnt mean that every large church has followed.

God can use a large church for His glory, men filled with the Holy Spirit giving out the Word of God, many turning to Christ.

How many times miracles took place we do not know, it is not all recorded in the Bible. How many times hundreds, thousands sat listening to the Apostles preach, believing on the LORD Jesus Christ for Salvation, again…… we will never know, everything that transpired is not written in the Scriptures.

1 And as they spake unto the people, the priests, and the captain of the temple, and the Sadducees, came upon them,

2 Being grieved that they taught the people, and preached through Jesus the resurrection from the dead.

3 And they laid hands on them, and put them in hold unto the next day: for it was now eventide.

4 Howbeit many of them which heard the word believed; and the number of the men was about five thousand.
Acts 4

Grace, there is a difference between Peter preaching to thousands in an evangelistic sense and the modern mega-church.

You do know that the early church generally met in homes, don’t you?

You do know that aside from theaters and arenas, there weren’t buildings able to house thousands, don’t you?

It is supremely bad reasoning to call Acts 4 the beginning of a megachurch.

The megachurches are concentrated among denominations that are starting to shrink. The megachurch model is a model heavily dependent on easy financing. I think banks are going to be reluctant to finance risky investments like new megachurches.

Megachurches are also dependent on new families for steady source of new members. The recession has slowed family formations and lowered birth rates. So much for new megachurch members.

As old megachurches shrink and die, there won’t be as many new ones to replace them. I don’t think the megachurch model is well suited for simultaneous economic and demographic decline.

trokt -22

YOU WROTE: “Grace, there is a difference between Peter preaching to thousands in an evangelistic sense and the modern mega-church.”

No difference at all.

YOU WROTE: “You do know that the early church generally met in homes, don’t you?”

Obviously when Peter was teaching they were not in home. I don’t know anyone who has a home that would seat 5,000 men and perhaps women and children.

YOU WROTE: “You do know that aside from theaters and arenas, there weren’t buildings able to house thousands, don’t you?”

There were hillsides, areas of land,…. a church doesn’t need walls and a roof, did you know that?

YOU WROTE: “It is supremely bad reasoning to call Acts 4 the beginning of a megachurch.”

It’s very logical, the masses Peter spoke to were huge, 5,000 men, plus women and children? – that’s not a small crowd.

Let’s not forget the 5,000 and 4,000 Christ preached to, that again was a huge group of people. As I’ve stated before we don’t know how many times these LARGE GROUPS OF PEOPLE GATHERED to HEAR the WORD of GOD.

Sal 23

YOU WROTE: “As old megachurches shrink and die, there won’t be as many new ones to replace them. I don’t think the megachurch model is well suited for simultaneous economic and demographic decline.”

Sal, the LORD uses mighty ways in which to spread the Gospel, be it small, medium, large or mega-churches. It’s HIS way, HIS direction, he makes the way. There are small, medium churches and larger ones that have failed – and then vise versa. A small church is not more Godly than a larger one, that’s a fallacy that many Christians believe, but it is not true. Economics isn’t the criteria in which God works, HE works whatever way he chooses, and sometimes it’s a mystery to little man.

Grace (@21), nothing in Acts 4 says that there were 5,000 men meeting together repeatedly in one place — the common understanding of what constitutes a church. It merely says “the number of men grew to about five thousand”, the implication being that that was the number of believers at that time, not of a particular congregation. Compare this with what we find two chapters earlier, “Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.” But nothing in the passages suggests that 5,000 Christians were meeting together repeatedly in one place.

Besides, you seem to have missed the obvious from Scripture with your extra-scriptural speculation on “hillsides, areas of land,….”:

Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts

If they met anywhere, it was in the temple courts. Of course, they didn’t do that for very long, as the Jews started turning on the Christians, and the temple courts ceased to exist shortly thereafter.

That said, the fact that they “broke bread in their homes” suggests that they did not do all their meeting at one time in one place.

tODD – 26

” It merely says “the number of men grew to about five thousand”, the implication being that that was the number of believers at that time, not of a particular congregation. Compare this with what we find two chapters earlier, “Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.” But nothing in the passages suggests that 5,000 Christians were meeting together repeatedly in one place.”

RIGHT, but nowhere does it say they did not meet there.

“If they met anywhere, it was in the temple courts. Of course, they didn’t do that for very long, as the Jews started turning on the Christians, and the temple courts ceased to exist shortly thereafter.

That said, the fact that they “broke bread in their homes” suggests that they did not do all their meeting at one time in one place.”

5,000 men at one time, perhaps with wives and children is a mega group. If it were only in the “temple courts” they must have been VERY LARGE. It does not say that they ALWAYS “broke bread in their homes” – where does it say that.

We as believers should be overjoyed when masses of people come to church, wherever that might be held to find the truth of Jesus Christ, it should be a joyous celebration – instead what I find here are the naysayers, those who cookie cutter the size of those who seek the truth.

Grace (@27), you are arguing from silence that your assertion — that all 5,000 believers at that time regularly met together in one place — is true. But there is no basis for this, other than the Scriptures not saying that “they did not meet there”. The thin basis of your argument speaks for itself.

In a society with religious freedom, it’s purely a question of marketing — are mega churches able to market their product better than smaller churches? Or can smaller churches still keep their niche? If a member is looking for a very specific brand of Christianity, or wants a more elite congregation, a mega-church won’t be an option. I expect both types of churches will exist.

“Bert, “baptistic”in the sense of denying the Real Presence.”

Jon, again, Schuller is REFORMED. R-E-F-O-R-M-E-D, which shares the doctrine of acknowledging the symbolic nature of the Lord’s Supper.

OK, to be fair to the Reformed, Schuller is only Reformed in name, but words mean things, and you’re not at liberty to throw bombs without being rebuked, especially arguably false ones.

tODD, regarding the early church, one can debate how long it lasted, but Acts 2: 46 does make it pretty clear that early church members were meeting daily in the temple. Other passages in the Old Testament also make it clear that large meetings (e.g. reading of the law in the times of Moses, Joshua, Josiah, Hezekiah, Passover/Yom Kippur observance, etc..) were well known to the Hebrews.

Now we can argue about whether such large assemblies ought to be normative for the church today, and you and I would agree, I believe, that shepherding thousands of families lies beyond the ability of almost all pastors. That said, it’s exactly what we see in Acts for the time between Pentacost and the time the church was dispersed in the first great persecution.

Hence, my (and I would guess your) objection to megachurches ought to be centered on the practicality of a pastor actually pastoring his flock, and not on a lack of Biblical precedent.

Who says a church should only have one pastor? If that is the case then the perfect church would be about 80-100 people. There are some nice things about a church that size, but there are some big limitations as well. Why can’t a church have multiple pastors? No pastor is strong in all the gifts required to pastor a church. In a multiple staff church pastors can in some ways specialize and therefore maximize their gift package. The preaching pastor will always be the visible leader of the church, but who says he has to do all of the visitation, counseling, teaching, etc. that occurs within a church?
It seems very narrow to dismiss a church purely based on size. Smallness is not a virtue. I love all Christ centered, Law & Gospel preaching churches that value the sacraments regardless of size. To continue to throw rocks at each other based on size only proves what the world thinks of us; that we are divisive, narrow minded, proud, argument loving fools who all think that we have everything figured out. Jesus will continue to use churches of all sizes to spread the gospel message until He finally comes back and we are all a part of one real and no longer invisible church. And that will be the biggest mega church of all time.

Churches aren’t immune to economic reality. They meet in buildings that are usually funded by banks. They depend on members having enough money to donate to fund debts/upkeep.

The church’s building and finances are all part of the left-hand side of God’s Kingdom.

The typical Megachurch model depends on times of plenty. In lean times those churches have special difficulty surviving.

On the other side of the spectrum small old rural congregations have the advantage of no debts and minimal operating expenses.

God uses all sorts of church sizes to spread HIS Gospel.

Some churches are ‘grand to look upon, inside they are adorned with all sorts of tapestry, wood carving, THEN, there are the churches who are all sorts of sizes that have no extra’s, the seating is plain, the carpet in durable, everything has been done, so as to seat as many people as possible to hear the Gospel.

I’ve been in many size churches, some high school gym’s, because the funds had not been met to start construction of the church. God ALMIGHTY uses all sorts of places, including homes, with people who spread HIS Word.

Who is little man to question how God uses that which he created to spread the Word, be it in a grand church, hillside, beach (yes there are beach churches, in Hawaii and elsewhere) home, gym, store front, it’s His Word, which touches deep within mans heart and soul, to move man to seek HIM and Salvation.

Well, thinking about tODD’s suggestion that the church in America tends to imitate and follow American consumers, I’d have to say that we’re going to start seeing a lot on internet churches.

#9: “Many megachurches do not offer the Lord’s Supper. ”

And of those who do, the vast majority only offer a snack – a tablespoon of grape juice and a crumb of bread – a pretty lame excuse for a supper.

36 – NatObser

“And of those who do, the vast majority only offer a snack – a tablespoon of grape juice and a crumb of bread – a pretty lame excuse for a supper.”

The size or portion of the Supper isn’t the point. Mocking those who love the LORD, take Communion, be it ever so small a serving, are doing what they are called to do. It might not be the size you consider of value, it might not contain alcohol, but it does come from the grape.

There are millions of people who have no money, nothing, they love the LORD with all their heart, a small piece of bread, a tiny swallow from the grape is their Supper which the LORD speaks of. God bless those who come to HIM in humility and reverence.

Small Town Megachurch : The prophecies of the social purification.

I think is important to remember, that Christianity is a worship based in the poverty of spirit, in those who mourn, in humbleness, hunger of righteousness, in mercy… in peace.

Someone can be disenchanted with its small town church but well yes, your are somehow right, who is going to provide philosophical, operational and theological integrity to govern you… I’m sure the Word will, check what it says Matthew 5:3-9

Yours is the kindom of heaven… for you poverty of spirit

You will be comforted… for your mourn

You will inherit the earth… for being meek

Your anger of justice will be filled… for your patience

Your will be show mercy (about any bad things you have done)… for being merciful

You will see God… for the purity of your heart

You will be called son of God, (like Christ?)… for being peacemaker… NOT FOR BEING FAMOUS OR HAVING LEADERSHIP SKILLS!!!

So if you are too small and persecuted, and they say evil against you, basically being a humble church makes you the light of the world and salt of the earth (Mat 5:13-14) and you inspire others to look for praise our Father in heaven (Mat 5:16)… yes, not many of them though but… it suppose to be few people in a real blessed small town Church (Mat 22:14)

You will get all that only because you stand those pancake fundraisers so many times… I think is a good covenant, Don’t you think?

But now if you really wanted to try something different, I can NOT recommend you to actually take it to practice but… you may want to review the book in the title of this note… this is what I think about those executive decisions:

Small Town Megachurch

(Book of Gary W. Carter) Had been long time since since I read such amount of megalomaniac delusions and antichrist philosophy since Mein Kampf. World Leadership, national reconstruction, God reigning through a designed group, God-sized vision, devil blocking or robbing “blessings”, strike forces “like a American Navy aircraft carrier”, use violence to make leaders to “reconsider” social policies… with just a casual mention of the need of “healthy society” among annually increased immigration… and the best -Religious and Social Controlled Towns- Great!! exactly what the society needs right now… more extremist groups. I just hope the guys in Churches like this don’t start using black shirts soon. Very ad hoc for the season.

At least you will learn how far of God those Mega-churches are and how anti-Christian is what they teach. And you will learn how true is what Jesus said:

“Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” Matt 19:24